Constellation X-Ray Mission: recent developments for mission concept and technology development

Abstract

The Constellation X-ray Mission is a high-throughput X-ray facility emphasizing observations at high spectral resolution (R ~ 300-3000) while covering a broad energy band (0.25-60 keV). The mission is intended to achieve a factor of 25-100 increase in sensitivity over current high resolution X-ray spectroscopy missions. Constellation-X is the X-ray astronomy equivalent of the Keck and the VLT, complementing the high spatial resolution capabilities of Changra. Constellation-X achieves its high-throughput and reduces mission risk by dividing the collecting area across four separate spacecraft launched two at a time into an L2 orbit. We describe the overall mission concept and also present a brief overview of alternate concepts which are under consideration. We discuss recent progress on the key technologies, including: lightweight, high-throughput X-ray optics, micro-caloriment spectrometer arrays, low-power and low-weight CCD arrays, lightweight gratings, multilayer coatings to enhance the hard X-ray performance of X-ray optics, and hard X-ray detectors.